Shirley sat in an armchair whose end tables held open crossword-puzzle books. She picked up one and wrote in an entry. I shrugged and took all the books and magazines from a wicker chair, stacking them on another side table and pulling the chair up so I was facing her.

“I was told you weren’t much interested in your daughter, and I can see that it’s true, so I won’t take a lot of your time.”

Shirley Kiel sat back in the chair, jaw slack, as if I’d slapped her. The puzzle book fell to the floor. “You don’t understand,” she said feebly.

She was right: I didn’t understand what it was like to have a child, let alone one who was grown and who was beyond my ability to help or cure. The pain would perhaps make you numb yourself with crossword puzzles. Make you apathetic to the dirt and debris around you. And maybe it would make you belittle your daughter’s own pain by pretending it was melodrama: Sonia Bernhardt.

“What’s she done this time to embarrass me?” The light baritone had swept into the room.

I turned to look. Nathan Kiel was a short man with a stocky body, but the force field of anger around him was so large that it seemed to push me against the back of the chair. His bio said he was eighty, but the brown eyes in his square face were alert, alive, even if the life was fueled by fury.

“I doubt she had you in mind,” I said dryly. “Do you know that she’s in a coma at the hospital?”

He grunted, affirmation I suppose. “And you are?”

“V.I. Warshawski. I’m a detective. I’m here from Chicago, trying—”

“You knew? You knew Sonia was in the hospital and you didn’t tell me?” Shirley’s pale eyes turned dark.

“What would you have done? Enacted one of your own dramas for me?” Kiel snorted. “Celia Cordley called me this morning—”

“Oh, Cee-Cee.” Shirley spoke with heavy sarcasm. “Another of Nate’s groupies, anxious for the approval of the great doctor. She hasn’t learned yet that his approval only comes if she spends the rest of her life following him around like an anxious puppy. You should tell her what happened to Ma—”

“Will you shut up?” Kiel bellowed. “I want to know what this detective is trying to stir up here in Lawrence. My daughter is seriously ill and very weak emotionally and morally. If you’re preying on her, you could open yourself to major litigation.”

“Dr. Kiel, you’re supposedly an impressive scientist, but you and logic parted company some miles back down the road. Far from preying on your daughter, I saved her life.”

“You knew there was a detective in town interested in Sonia and you didn’t tell me?” Shirley blazed again.